GIS and GPS Question?

Question

can i use files from gis in a gps or vise versa? The files are in a specific format for GPS files

Answer 1

It can be tricky to go from consumer GPS unit formats to GIS formats.  The best thing to do is to stick with shapefiles for the GIS software and GPX files for the GPS receiver.  Those are the most basic formats for each use.  There is a program called gpx2shp for converting from GPX to shapefile.  You could also try converting your GIS data to KML.  You can either use the KML exporting feature built into ArcGIS 9.3 or use the free Export to KML extension available on ArcScripts, which will work with 9.2 or 9.3.  Once you get the GIS data into KML, you could then use something like GPSBabel to convert the KML into whatever format your GPS receiver uses.  Going back and forth between consumer GPS units and GIS software is a pain because of all the format conversions.  To top things off, sometimes stuff from the GPS receiver doesn't come up in the GIS correctly because of projection and coordinate system issues.